IEP

IEPs are dumb. That’s the school district process whereby people who have never met Maggie spend 30 minutes with her and evaluate all of the things she can and cannot do and make recommendations about how she’s going to get better. I mean, how is that even possible?

You go, sit in a room and all of these people tell you all of the things that are wrong with your kid and then they tell you they aren’t really going to offer any services to help her.

We have a neurologist trained in this particular disease advising 3 hours of OT, PT and Speech therapy every week. The district? 120 minutes of PT/year. 60 minutes of consultative OT/week. Speech is the only one that got close at 120 minutes/week, though none of that would be required to be direct one on one instruction.

I mean, I’m going to fight it and I’m going to win, but I don’t know why the process has to be so annoying. It’s like buying a car – why do I have to argue on the price – just give me the lowest price you can and we’ll both be happy. You’ll sell more cars because you’re not wasting so much time putting on your ridiculous negotiation show. They’d be able to help so many more kids if they didn’t have to waste resources on due process and mediation. And who wouldn’t fight for this face:

Anyways this is just the beginning of the fight – here’s the letter I wrote to them as I boiled with frustration after three days of thinking about it. I had to rewrite this 5 times to avoid being too pushy. I can only imagine the wrath I’ll feel if this drags on:

I know everyone is trying to do the best they can by her, but just so you know, I very strongly disagree with the limited PT and OT recommendations. 60 minutes of consultative ot/week feels really light. As does 120 minutes/year of pt, especially considering the safety concerns and the fact she can’t actually access the equipment without maximum adult support. Not to mention the fact that she’s been in intensive PT since her last IEP and she’s only been able to maintain her skills – more PT would allow her to progress and that needs to be provided by the school. Same with OT – she can’t use her hands, hardly at all, how is 60 minutes of indirect ot going to remedy that so she can actually learn how to write?

I’m not sure if the IEP meeting was the place for me to voice that, or if I’m just supposed to go through due process to get there. But, if there’s any way to sway that recommendation before the IEP gets booked, I’d sure like to avoid the process, as I’m sure everyone else would.

Thanks – I’ve just been thinking about it the last few days and figured I should voice my thoughts sooner, rather than later. You mentioned that the parents are a part of the IEP team, but I didn’t feel like I could actually disagree at the meeting. I felt like it was more a venue for me to hear it.

Also, as a general rule, I’d think that hearing what she’s incapable of doing is a bad way to go about IEP assessment. It should always be the opposite perspective. Lyn Dee was great – sharing what she can do and how she wanted to supplement that progress. It’s such a stressful thing for special needs parents, I’d advise any assessors to go about it that way instead of starting from the negative.